Technical Field
The present invention relates to a vibration generator and a stacked-structure generator that provide an electrical energy self-supplying approach for Internet of Things, implanted medical devices and portable electronic devices. That is, the present invention relates to a generator and its application, which is designed to, based on electrostatic induction effect, capture energy from mechanical motion, vibration, collision and friction in daily life.
Description of the Related Art
Recently, the developing Internet of Things needs a large number of sensors distributed at various locations. A difficult point of implementing this technology is to supply electrical energy to these sensors at distributed locations. Further, in medical field, it is common to implant chip(s) in an organism body. However, an obstacle for implanted therapeutics technology is how to continuously supply electrical energy to the implanted chip(s). In addition, it is needed to supply electrical energy for portable electronic devices in daily life, such as ipad, iphone, electronic book, notebook computer. In this circumstance, a new concept of energy self-capturing or energy self-powering is provided to address the current problems. Currently, researches focused on this and proposed nanoscale generators based on photoelectricity (referring to Park, S. H. et al. Bulk heterojunction solar cells with internal quantum efficiency approaching 100%. Nature Photonics 3, 297-302 (2009); Chen, H. Y. et al. Polymer solar cells with enhanced open-circuit voltage and efficiency. Nature Photonics 3, 649-653 (2009)), piezoelectric effect (referring to Wang, Z. L. and Song, J. H. Piezoelectric nanogenerators based on zinc oxide nanowire arrays. Science 312, 242-246 (2006); Yang R., Qin Y., Dai L. M. and Wang Z. L., Power generation with laterally packaged piezoelectric fine wires. Nature Nanotechnology 4, 34-39 (2009); Chang, C., Tran, V. H., Wang, J. B., Fuh, Y. K. and Lin, L. W. Direct-write piezoelectric polymeric nanogenerator with high energy conversion efficiency. Nano Lett 10, 726-731 (2010).) and thermoelectric effect (referring to Hochbaum, A. I. et al. Enhanced thermoelectric performance of rough silicon nanowires. Nature 451, 163-167 (2008); Snyder, G. J. and Toberer, E. S. Complex thermoelectric materials. Nature Materials 7, 105-114 (2008)).
A electrostatic induction based generator is also reported recently (referring to Fan, F. R., Tian, Z. Q., Wang, Z. L. Nano Energy 1, 328-334 (2012); Fan, F. R. et al. Transparent triboelectric nanogenerators and self-powered pressure sensors based on micropatterned plastic films. Nano Letters 12, 3109-3114 (2012); Zhu, G. et al. Triboelectric-generator-driven pulse electrodeposition for micropatterning. Nano Letters 12, 4960-4965 (2012); Wang, S., Lin, L. and Wang, Z. L. Nanoscale triboelectric-effect-enabled energy conversion forsustainably powering portable electronics. Nano Letters 12, 6339-6346 (2012).). This type of triboelectric generator may achieve an output voltage of 230 volt and an output power of 9 mW (i.e., 3.56 mW/cm2) by means of an arched structure (as shown in FIG. 1) (referring to Wang, S., Lin, L. and Wang, Z. L. Nanoscale triboelectric-effect-enabled energy conversion forsustainably powering portable electronics. Nano Letters 12, 6339-6346 (2012)). However, in practice, the arched structure is not in favor of absorption of energy from the environment.